SOURCE AND DISTRIBUTION OF THE GOLD 





357 





auriferous detritus than in the solid vein. We say apparently, because it is 

 not so easy to give satisfactory proof for this generally accepted article of 

 belief. It does appear, however, as if there was some truth in the idea that 

 the finding of large pieces of gold in the gravel is not justified by what we 

 see of the occurrence of the metal in the quartz. It is certain, at all events, 

 that the form of the ordinary nugget is something different from that which 

 is offered by the gold as originally deposited. And before proceeding further 

 in this discussion, a few words may be offered in regard to the shape and 

 character of the metal, when in its natural condition, as associated with the 

 quartz or with any other mineral or rock. The writer has had many oppor- 

 tunities to study the shape and appearance of the native gold enclosed in the 

 quartz. The metal presents in such cases a great variety of forms, but it 

 never occurs, so far as the writer is aware, in rounded, smooth pieces, such 

 as used to be found not unfrequently in the placer mines along the course of 

 the present streams. 



The larger part of the gold contained in the quartz exists in the form of 

 particles invisible to the naked eye ; and there are many mines, which are 

 producing largely and paying handsomely, where free gold can hardly ever 



Indeed, there is a general 



be seen at all in the rock going to the stamps. 



belief among the miners that u 



specimen mines 



7 J 



or those where the free 



are 



gold is segregated from the quartz so as to form handsome specimens — 

 not likely to be persistent. 



Where the gold is visible to the eye in the quartz, the predominating form 

 which it exhibits is that which is best expressed by the term a scaly," — a 

 word used by the placer and hydraulic miners in describing the small, 

 rounded, flattened pieces with which they so frequently meet. When the 

 gold is collected into continuous thread-like forms, these are usually found 

 on examination to be made up of aggregations of very irregularly grouped 

 filmy or scale-like particles. The metallic portion in such cases, if freed from 

 the quartz without alteration of its form, would present itself in rough and 

 extremely irregular shapes. A very large proportion of the gold, if visible 

 to the naked eye at all, has this appearance. Occasionally, however, this 

 metal occurs in thin plates or leaves, with rather smooth surfaces. Such 

 forms appear, however, to be almost, if not quite, exclusively limited in their 

 occurrence to veins in which the quartz is in combs, or parallel layers having 

 their opposite faces lined with crystals; it is between these crystalline 

 •plates that the leaf-gold usually occurs. 









